Ex-con charged with murder in teen's death

An ex-convict already charged with sexually assaulting a 14-year-old boy whose body was found in Lincoln Park in August was charged Tuesday with first-degree murder in the case, authorities said.

Shawn Thigpen, 28, is expected to appear in bond court Wednesday to face the new charge in the slaying of Michael Williams, who was found in the park Aug. 18. He had been assaulted and suffocated.

"It's fantastic and a relief," said Williams' father, Michael Williams Sr. But the elder Williams is still bothered by apparent missteps in the handling of DNA evidence in Thigpen's case. Thigpen also is charged with assaulting or attempting to assault three other youths.

The Tribune last month reported that records show Thigpen could have been linked to the March 2004 assault of a Berwyn teen well before he met Williams if DNA testing had been done promptly.

"I just felt like if the work had been done, this wouldn't have happened," Williams said. "Maybe they need to hire some more people at the lab. But if it's broken, it needs to be fixed--that's it."

Thigpen was paroled from state prison in February 2004, but his DNA was not immediately processed into state and national DNA databases, authorities have said.

In March of that year, Chicago police asked the Illinois State Police Forensic Science Center to test a DNA sample taken from a 16-year-old Berwyn youth who had been assaulted. Records show the lab did not match Thigpen's DNA to the sample in the case of the Berwyn teen for a year and a half, and only after Williams already had been killed.

DNA evidence left at the crime scene in the Williams case also matches Thigpen, prosecutors have said.

State police officials have said they would look into the troubles in the case to see if it was an isolated problem or evidence of systemic issues. On Tuesday, Lincoln Hampton, spokesman for the Illinois State Police and the crime lab, said officials had "nothing further" to say on the case.